


Emperor's Eggs

by KtwoNtwo



Series: The Emperor's Edge Collection [1]
Category: The Emperor's Edge Series - Lindsay Buroker
Genre: Cross-posted from EE Forum, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-07
Updated: 2014-01-11
Packaged: 2018-01-07 22:05:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1124917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KtwoNtwo/pseuds/KtwoNtwo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of scenes from the Emperor's Edge novel from the point of view of Isabel the chicken.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story was previously posted on the Emperor's Edge forum ( http://the-emperors-edge.com/forum/index.php ). I have reposted it here to consolidate all my derivitive works in one place. My use name on the forum is K2N2.
> 
> Standard Disclaimer: The characters and other information from the Emperor’s Edge series and all rights thereto belong to Lindsay Buroker. I’m only playing around with them for my own amusement.

At least it was warm here. The trip from the farm had been one cold miserable experience. She’d been unceremoniously scooped up from her roost in the hen house and crammed into a crate with a number of her flock mates. The next day had been full of swaying and bumping, the sound and sent of dogs, but most of all it had been cold. Cold enough so that they all huddled together in a corner of the crate attempting to keep warm. It was so cold that the normal flock dominance games had not come into play. No one had the energy to do more than occasionally squawk in complaint at a particularly jarring bump.

When the crate had been opened she had found herself in a makeshift pen in a larger room. The pen wasn’t much bigger than the hen house. She couldn’t see much of the room beyond because the pen was made out of a corner of a bigger room surrounded by walls made of boxes and crates. There was a gap that had some sort of wire mesh keeping them in and through it she could occasionally see light from the outside. They had straw to nest in. A young female two-legger provided food and water. The rest of the flock was content but she wondered what was beyond the boxes and the mesh grate. 

A day later she got her chance. They were fed and watered that morning by a different two-legger. This one was older and appeared to be in a hurry. It slammed down the pan of feed instead of scattering it. It didn’t even bother to refill the water dish. However, it also didn’t secure the mesh gate quite right. There was a gap down at one corner. The gap was big enough she estimated that a determined bird could push her way through. She was a determined bird.

A bit later she was through and into the larger room. It wasn’t as large as the barn but it was sure larger than the hen house and the pig pen combined. There were boxes that smelled like grains, bins that smelled like potatoes and onions, some display tables with other vegetables on it and stacks of cylindrical hard things. She started to investigate looking around and occasionally pecking at things. A large juicy looking bug startled her by scuttling out from under a shelf she was looking at. She gave chase. It was faster than its appearance suggested so she used her wings to give a bit of extra speed. It ran under a large pile of the cylindrical things. She was going too fast to stop so she jumped and fluttered attempting to reach the top of the pile. 

Much to her surprise she managed to flutter up to the top of the pile and land. While the perch was a bit precarious it did provide a good view of the room. She could see the makeshift pen, a door to the outside, and everything else in the room including three two-leggers talking at a counter near the door. One of the two-leggers was the young one who normally fed them. That two-legger seemed to be identified by the sound Ma-ri-ah. The older two-legger who had provided food this morning was making noise at Ma-ri-ah. Judging from the body language she decided that the older two-legger was the top bird in the pecking order. The third two-legger had different plumage. Ah that one must belong to a different flock. 

Just then the door to the outside opened and a fourth two-legger entered. This one looked right at her and said in a tone of surprise, “What’s that chicken doing on top of the coffee tins?”

After a bit of gabbling between the two-leggers, Ma-ri-ah carefully approached her perch and reached up to grab her. She wasn’t too sure she wanted to be grabbed and spread her wings in preparation to flutter away. Ma-ri-ah lunged, missed and went crashing into the pile of coffee tins knocking them all over the floor. She was prepared for this and took off when Ma-ri-ah made her move. She fluttered over a shelf and down to the floor. The older two-legger blocked one end of the aisle so she turned and ran the other direction rounding the end of the shelf and darting behind a bin sitting on the floor. A two-legger, most likely the one that had entered from outside, reached behind the bin and attempted to grab her. She pecked the hand as it came close and was rewarded with a squawk. 

The next several minutes were chaotic. She tried to make the door to the outside only to find it shut with no way a bird of her size could get out. Panicking she ran around avoiding the two-leggers who were trying to catch her. Finally Ma-ri-ah managed to trap her behind some boxes on a shelf. She was caught and returned to the makeshift pen. 

Unfortunately Ma-ri-ah noticed the gap in the door and fixed it. Obviously she wasn’t going to get out that way again. She started looking for other escape routes or at least somewhere she could see the rest of the room. It was clear to her that she was going to need to study these two-leggers carefully and figure out how they behaved before trying anything else. 

It wasn’t too hard to find a perch up on the box walls of the pen where she could see the room. She settled in to wait and watch.


	2. Chapter 2

After day of observation she came to some conclusions. Two-leg pecking order was in part determined by the amount they talked. Ms-bur-hol-der was the top bird equivalent and talked a lot. Ma-ri-ah was second and a third two-legger, Car-ry was the bottom. There were members other flocks that came to the room to get feed. She wasn’t sure but there seemed to be some sort of pecking order between flocks. Sometimes one or another with impeccable plumage would come in the door. Whenever that happened Ms-bur-hol-der talked a lot to the new comer but with body language that indicated she expected to be pecked. Whenever that happened inevitably the new comer had “cre-st” at the end of the series of sounds that she now realized was the way two-leggers identified each other.

She sat on her perch musing on the strangeness of the two-legger pecking order when her attention was caught by the sound of the bell that indicated the outside door opening. A large male two-legger sauntered into the shop as if he owned it. He was tall. Taller than the farmer or his hired hand. Quite a bit taller than Ms-bur-hol-der, Ma-ri-ah and Car-ry. In fact, he could reach up with his hand and touch the top of the door frame with no stretching required. His plumage was the sort that she had come to recognize as being that of the most prestigious flock. Between the clothes and the way he strode in, this two-legger reminded her of one of the fancy-tailed roosters that the farmer bred for sale. They were uniformly gorgeous creatures but not a brain in their heads between them.

He stopped in front of the counter and surveyed the room. She wasn’t quite sure exactly what he was looking for but his eyes stopped at the window, the door to the store room, and the side door. It was almost as if he was gaging possible escape routes. But why would such a pretty, obviously high class male need with an escape route? Was there perhaps another flock out to pull out his tail feathers? He took a second glance around the shop. She was a little surprised when he spotted her sitting up in her perch among the boxes. No other two-legger had ever spotted her in her perch. That was interesting. Maybe this two-legged rooster wasn’t empty-headed after all.

He started talking to Ma-ri-ah who had been standing behind the counter. Judging from Ma-ri-ah’s reaction this two-legger was not only high status but also seriously attractive. Ma-ri-ah was doing the two-leg equivalent of fluffing her feathers and strutting for attention. It looked like that given half a chance she’d start preening him. Rooster-like, he was encouraging and enjoying her behavior. But still, she could tell, he was aware of the doors, the window and surprisingly her.

Because of this high level of awareness he didn’t startle when Ms-bur-hol-der slipped out of the storeroom. No, he merely turned to acknowledge her as the higher member of the pecking order. Ma-ri-ah did not seem to be too happy at this state of affairs but before she could become too discontent he turned back and graced her with that strange barring of teeth which two-leggers used to express pleasure. This rooster was smart. He was keeping all the two-leg flock in line and paying attention to him. She was impressed at his skill. None of the other two-legs from outside had managed to do that.

The secondary members of the flock soothed he started in on what she had come to identify as the food procurement dance. This one started the same but quickly changed into something else altogether. Ms-bur-hol-der started waiving her hands and gesturing vigorously. Previously this behavior had been associated with a retelling of her escape and the collapse of the can pile. What was it doing in the middle of the food dance?

The fancy rooster, as she was beginning to think of him, seemed to be encouraging the hand waving behavior. He even managed to include Ma-ri-ah in the ritual of retelling. After a while Ms-bur-hol-der gave Ma-ri-ah a set of instructions and started bustling around assembling items. Ma-ri-ah immediately headed for the back store room. This, at least, was familiar even though the food dance had been strange. If things went as usual Ms-bur-hol-der would place the food in a bag or a box, Ma-ri-ah would return with whatever had been in the back room and the stranger would go away. Sure enough Ms-bur-hol-der was putting items in several bags but Ma-ri-ah had just returned from the store room but she was carrying the crate that the flock had arrived in. _What?!_ She clucked softly to herself in agitation.

Ma-ri-ah entered the makeshift pen, carefully closing the wire mesh behind her. She put the crate down on its side, opened the door, and placed some feed inside the box. Stepping back Ma-ri-ah waited while the flock scrabbled into the crate to get at the extra feed. Stupid, she clucked to herself. They would be caught due to their own greed. Sure enough as soon as the last of the flock was in the crate Ma-ri-ah closed the lid behind them.

In the meantime Ms-bur-hol-der had finished packing the food into carry bags. The fancy-rooster had been talking to her the whole time. Ms-bur-hol-der seemed to enjoy it. In fact she was exhibiting the same strutting, feather fluffing like behavior that Ma-ri-ah had been earlier. When the food bags were full the rooster looked around the shop again and spotted her on her perch. _Rotten bugs._ She’d hoped to escape notice.

“Hey, I think you missed one!” The fancy-rooster pointed.

_Fermented rotten bugs!_

“Thank you,” Ma-ri-ah said to the rooster and started for her perch.

She looked around quickly. There was another box out of line higher up on the makeshift wall. She hopped and fluttered up to this new, higher perch. Hopefully she would be out of reach. Ma-ri-ah made a frustrated sound then put a handful of feed on the old perch.

_Like I’m going to fall for that_. She clucked at Ma-ri-ah but made no move toward the feed.

After a few minutes of Ma-ri-ah attempting to coax her down to the lower perch and her indignant clucking the rooster entered the small enclosure.

“Here my lady,” he said to Ma-ri-ah. “Let me try. If I can convince some of my mother’s friends to patronize certain establishments I ought to be able to charm a chicken!” He looked directly at her up on her perch then and commented under his breath “I’m sure you are at least as intelligent as some of the old bats.” He then continued in a slightly louder but still in a soothing tone of voice. “Come here girl.”

She clucked curiously down at him. No one had ever spoken directly to her before. She moved slightly to get a better look at this strange rooster like two-legger.

“That’s it,” he crooned. “You are obviously a very intelligent bird. Good looking too. Now be a good girl and come to Maldynado.” Too late she realized that he’d managed to distract her with his talk as he gently grabbed her around the body and lifted her off her perch. She had forgotten to account for his height and reach. He continued still using that soothing tone of voice, “That’s a good girl. You are a wonderful example of a chicken. I think I’ll call you Isabel. You look like an Isabel.” He carried her over to the crate where Ma-ri-ah was standing ready to open the lid.

“You are naming a chicken?” Ma-ri-ah asked him, clearly astonished.

“It seems rude not to give her a name,” he replied evenly as he placed her gently in the crate with her flock-mates. “Especially since she’s shown such personality and initiative.”

The crate lid closed. _Hmmm. I need to be careful with this two-legger. He’s different. I need to watch and observe him carefully. He could be a threat._


	3. Chapter 3

The crate swayed but didn’t bounce much as Rooster carried them along.  _Hopefully we are not going very far.  I really don’t want to experience another cold bumpy ride like the one from the farm_.  

Her wish was granted as she heard the sound of a door and then a male voice asked, “Are those air holes?”  

She caught a whiff of alcohol.  It was something like the smell on the farm hand the time when he came back from his day off and fell into the manure pile but not quite that strong.  No, it was similar to the leftover stuff that the farmer used to give the pigs as slops after the grape harvest.  Wine, that was what the farmer had been making, she remembered. 

The crate tilted suddenly causing several of her flock-mates to squawk loudly. 

“Chickens?” a female voice asked. 

“You could have sent someone to help me carry things.”  That was Rooster’s voice.

“You bought all of that for ten ranmyas?” The wine voice again.

“Actually, I got if for free,” the Rooster was smug.

The crate was put down on a hard surface.

The Rooster continued, “I was just going to buy some cans of corned meat, but I started talking with the shopkeeper, and she told me about this problem she was having. Apparently, some farmer rode his dogsled out of the fields and across the lake to barter for supplies. He brought lots of fresh farm things to trade.”

“Like chickens?” That was a new voice. Male, younger but with an overlay of something that made her feathers feel strange. As he spoke the owner of the voice lifted the lid and peered in. His hair stood up like a cock-comb and his face looked as if he’d lost a peck-fight with a bunch of rocks. The strange feeling was stronger now. The only thing she could compare it to was the time just before the barn had been hit by lightning but without the smell. She hunkered down to make herself smaller as the lightning two-leg licked his lips.

“Anyway,” the Rooster continued, “this shopkeeper had all these chickens in the back making noise, needing to be fed, doing what chickens do after they’re fed. Apparently, one escaped and pecked a customer yesterday. The shopkeeper sent a message to the closest butcher, but he wanted to charge her to take away the chickens. So I smiled and said, ‘Why don’t I take those chickens for free?’ She was so relieved that she gave me a bunch of the other food the famer had brought in. We have fresh bacon, goat cheese, dried apples, cider and tomorrow, we’ll have eggs.”

“Nice” Lightning purred with undertones that made her feathers ruffle.

“Good work,” said the female voice. “Let’s have something to eat, then we’ll get busy. Maldynado you’re the official shopper for the group now.”

Then she heard a new voice. It was flat, emotionless and pitched to be barely audible. It murmured “Wise choice.” That voice gave her chills and made her want to hunker down into a corner. It was even worse that the feeling she got from Lightning. It reminded her for some reason of a predator. It felt like the large cat that had prowled around the barn and hen house once when she was just a chick. Luckily at that point the crate top was replaced and she didn’t have to see the two-legger that went with that voice just yet.

Safe in the crate with her flock-mates she listened carefully. Judging from the conversation the female was in charge. She talked the most and the others seemed to listen and defer to her. Predator was the second. He didn’t talk much but she could hear the fear in the other three men’s voices when they responded directly to his comments. His voice made her shiver.

Rooster, Lightning and Wine all appeared to be about equal. No, as she listened more she started to figure out that each seemed to have talent in one area or another. Rooster was good at finding food and other things. Wine, if she could believe what she was hearing, seemed to have some ability at fixing stuff. Lightning was presumably important for that lightning feeling, whatever it was.

Listening also gave her the sounds that the two-leggs used to identify each other. Rooster was Mal-din-a-do. Wine used the pattern Bu-ks and Lightning Axe-tyr. The female was Am-ar-an-th but Rooster called her Boss. That appeared to be the two-leg sound for highest bird in the flock. She wasn’t quite sure what the Predator used since the others tended to avoid using anything that she could determine was a sound pattern for him. It was good to know the sounds. She could now keep track of the conversation when they talked about each other. It was hard though to think about them using those sounds so she decided to use her own identifiers. That would be much less confusing.


	4. Chapter 4

It had been three days since Rooster had brought the flock here to this warehouse. He and Wine had managed to jury rig a pen out of old boards and wire fencing. Lightning had done something to fuse the wire to the boards somehow. No obvious escape holes. Rats. There was straw and a roosting bar. All in all it was a comfortable nest, however, she wanted to explore.

Rooster seemed to be in charge of caring for the flock although Wine and occasionally Boss would toss them some feed or change the water. Lightning just ignored them. Predator also seemed to ignore the flock but she was not fooled. She could see that Predator was always aware of everything in his environment, including the flock.

It took her a day or two but she determined that Predator was known as Si-car-ee-us even though the others rarely used the sound while he was in the room. She decided that that she’d been right likening him to a big cat. He didn’t walk; he prowled or stalked silently wherever he went. He wore all black and despite that mop of blond hair had a cat-like ability to disappear into the shadows. Early each morning he climbed into the rafters and walked on the beams. He even had claws like a cat. They mostly were shiny silver and he worked to keep them sharp and clean. There was one claw though that was all black. She never saw him sharpen that one.

Rooster had taken to calling her Is-a-bell. She was the only one of the flock that had earned a specific set of two-leg sounds. She showed her appreciation by not hiding her eggs and pecking at his boots when he came to five them feed and clean the pen. She even let him touch her feathers a few times.

All of the two-leggers seemed to be very concerned with the big piece of machinery they had set up on the morning of the second day. It was bigger and had more moving parts than a harvester. She had no idea what it was for. Once Wine had it cleaned and fixed it only seemed to eat paper then spit it out smelly, wet and colored. It had to be watched and fussed with constantly. The two-leggers would take the result and hand ig up to dry. Once dry they would cut the paper into smaller pieces. Boss was very pleased with the result.

Night before last she had concluded that whatever the two-leggers were doing with the machine it somehow had attracted an even bigger predator than Predator. In fact, Predator had himself been concerned about the thing that had been sniffing around. His whispered discussion with Boss in the middle of the night had caused Boss to wake up her flock and send them up into the rafters for safety. She decided that anything bad enough to worry Predator was something that scared her stiff. Hopefully, she and her flock-mates would be too small to notice as the whatever-it-was that had made the horrific scream went after larger, tastier prey.

Last night had passed uneventfully much to her relief. She had awoken when the dawn peaked through the upper windows of the warehouse. Somehow with the light shining down just right she saw it; a way out of the pen. Hop on the roosting bar then flutter over to a half broken board serving as a post. From there it was a flutter to another post and then up and over the wire fencing.

She had a good half an hour of exploration time until Rooster noticed she wasn’t in the pen. She wasn’t quite sure how he could tell that it was her that was missing but, as she had determined back in the shop Rooster was not an unobservant two-leg. Thus she was not surprised when he located her quickly after verifying her escape. He had a long stride and reach she remembered. Rooster also knew that she was not as easily enticed with food as the rest of the flock so he didn’t even attempt that. Instead he tried to sneak up on her while whispering random compliments in a soothing tone of voice. That coaxing voice was a danger too. He tried it several times but he did not move like Predator. She always knew when he was going to lunge and attempt to grab her.

Wine was minding the metal contraption. Feeding it paper and hanging up the wet results to dry. The process distracted her and Rooster almost caught her leg. She squawked and ran around the table with Rooster in hot pursuit.

“Isabel,” he called as he ran. “Come back here, girl!”

Wine momentarily stopped what he was doing and commented, “Apparently you’re not a smooth with the women as you claim.”

“Oh, be quiet. You could help.” Rooster snapped back and then to her, “Isabel stop running.”

“I have real work to do,” was Wine’s retort.

She ran around the table, under a stool and then around a counter.

There was a loud thud followed by, “Emperor’s harry balls!” Rooster had run into the counter.

She squawked her triumph as he fell behind. She took the next corner at high speed and headed for the door, her claws clicking and occasionally finding extra purchase in the worn floorboards.

_Pig slop!_

Predator had silently appeared in the doorway in front of her. She let out another piercing squawk, feinted right then attempted to dart past him on the left. It was no use. He simply bent and deftly plucked her off the floor.

If she hadn’t been so preoccupied with the fact that Predator had grabbed her she might have found Rooster’s attempt to stop before crashing into them, funny. As it was, all she really was aware of was Predator’s scent, a mixture of two-leg male and the oil he used to sharpen his claws, and over that Rooster’s fear. She clucked in a state of panic.

Much to her surprise Predator didn’t kill her out of hand for her attempted escape. No he simply held her. One hand and part of his arm was under her. The other hand pinioned her wings so she couldn’t flap. She was too scared to peck him but what was that? His fingers were caressing her under her feathers. It felt good. Really good. She found herself relaxing into Predator’s hold.

Rooster on the other hand was looking back and forth from her to Predator. It was like he was unsure if Predator wanted a meal. Once she had calmed down, Predator extended his arms to allow Rooster to take her. Rooster’s grip was a little tight and he didn’t loosen it when she fussed at him. She attempted to peck him all the way back to the pen


	5. Chapter 5

Another few days passed. Rooster took care of the flock. The rest of the two-leggers, including Rooster, came and went at intervals. Most of the time the flock was ignored.

She kept looking for ways out of the pen. She didn’t have much hope but she kept looking anyway. A day after her attempted escape when the rest of the two-legs were outside the warehouse, Predator had come over and examined the pen. He’d stared at her for a while then methodically proceeded to eliminate every potential escape route she’d identified as well as a few she’d dismissed as too difficult. After he was done he stood and looked at her again. She had no problem understanding his message. Next time she got out he’d eat her if he caught her.

She shivered just remembering that stare. Then she shivered again as the door banged open letting in a blast of cold air. Lightning had grabbed the door frame and swung into the room blurting “Enforcers! Coming down the hill.”

“Spitted dead ancestors.” Wine was upset. He usually didn’t curse.

“Don’t worry.” That was Boss in her giving orders tone. “We’re ready. Everyone grab something, and let’s go.”

Wine and Lightning grabbed the flock’s original crate which was now packed with paper pieces.

“How many enforcers?” Rooster asked as he belted on a long claw.

“It doesn’t matter. We’re not killing any more of them,” Boss said. “Door. Now.”

Rooster sprinted to the pen and threw open the latch. The entire flock streamed out, squawking uproariously. Rooster tried to usher them to the door.

“Leave them,” Boss hissed.

“Not for some enforcer to throw in a stew,” Rooster replied.

_He really cared. He wasn’t just in it for the eggs._

Boss and Rooster were the last ones out the back door just as the front door busted in. A bunch of two-leggers all in similar colored plumage ran in. That just upset her flock-mates more and they fluttered and ran around haphazardly tripping and pecking the two-leggers as they went.

Isabel, she had decided to use Rooster’s sound for her when he’d opened the pen and let them out, carefully avoided the chaos and headed for the back door. Given that Boss had shooed her flock out, Isabel decided that vacating the premises was most likely a good idea. She reached the back door unmolested and gave a loud cry. Hopefully that would alert at least some of her flock-mates to the escape route.

For the next few minutes she concentrated on staying out of the way of the uniform plumaged two-legs. Finally they seemed to calm down and get somewhat organized.

“Corporal, take your men and check the warehouses and the nearby docks” some male voice ordered.

“Find their tracks,” yelled a voice from inside. “The fire barrels are still warm. They haven’t been gone long.”

Isabel decided that this might be a good time to get out of sight. She thought that there might be a good place to hide under that dock over there. Now how to get there? Rooster normally walked like he owned the world. She decided that she would do the same. She strutted down the cannery dock intent on her goal.

“Oh, good. Isabel got out.” She heard Rooster’s whisper as it echoed faintly off the ice under the dock.

She could just barely hear Boss’s reply to him “We’d better put a couple more docks behind us.”

Isabel realized that this meant she’d be on her own. Well that was just fine with her. Two-leggers were just too strange to try and live with. She’d round up her remaining flock-mates, find a place to roost and maybe even try to locate a rooster that wasn’t too dumb. She ducked under the dock to hide. As she did she wondered what would happen to Rooster and the others. Predator would land on his feet just like the cat she often compared him to. Boss was a competent flock leader. Isabel was sure they’d be just fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always with my apologies to master William:
> 
> If this writer has offended,  
> Think but this and all is mended.  
> That you have but tarried here,  
> While each chapter did appear,  
> And these words upon this theme,  
> Are of no import, only my dream.
> 
> It has been an honor to share my dream with you.  
> K2N2


End file.
